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DON  QUIXOTE-Platk  11 

DOS     QUI  A  O  I'h:     C  A  R  h  D     h  OR     AT     T  H  A     /  A  A 


HOGARTH'S 

REJECTED  and  SUPPRESSED 

P  L ATES 


CONS/STING  OF  THE  SEVEN  DISCARDED 
PLATES  TO  ILLUSTRATE  CERVANTES'S 
DON  QUIXOTE  AND  THE  '•TWO  LITTLE 
PICTURES,  CALLED  BEFORE  AND  AFTER. 
FOR    MR.     THOMSON'' 


WITH      AN      ESSAY      BY      THE      LATE 

JOHN     LA     FAROE 

PRESIDENT       SOCIETY       OF       AMERICAN       ARTISTS 


PRIVATELY      PRINTED      FOR      MEMBERS      OF      THE 
FRATERNITY    OF    ODD   VOLUMES.    NEV^    YORK    1913 


Of  this  edition,  printed  for  Members 
of  The  Fraternity  of  Odd  Volumes, 
but  One- hundred -and -fifty  copies 
have  been  issued,  of  which  this  is  copy 
Ka 


^i^t  of  piatcs 


DON     QUIXOTE 

Plate  I 

Marcela's  Defence  at  the  Grave 

of  Chrysostom. 

Plate  II 
Don  Quixote  Cared  For  at  the  Inn. 

Plate  III 

The  Lofty  Adventure  and  Rich  Winning 

of  Mambrino's  Helmet. 

Plate  IV 
Don  Quixote  Liberates  the  Galley-Slaves. 

Plate  V 

Don  Quixote  Meets  the  Knight 

of  the  Ranges. 

Plate  VI 

The    Curate    and    the    Barber 

Disguising  Themselves. 

Plate  VII 
Sancho  Starved  By  His  Physician. 


BEFORE  AND  AFTER 
Two  Plates  in  Portfolio  on  Back  Cover. 


2073R09 


THE     ESSAY 

BY 

John     La     Fargk 


WILLIAM    HOGARTH 


N  the  25th  of  October,  1764,  says  his 
biographer,  "  WiUiam  Hogarth,  very 
weak,  but  remarkably  cheerful,  received 
an  agreeable  letter  from  the  American, 
Dr.  Franklin,    and   drew   up   a    rough 

draft  of  an  answer  to  it.    *   *   *   Two  hours  afterward, 

he  expired." 


"Death  had  closed  the  curious  eyes 
That  saw  the  manners  in  the  face." 


I  have  not  been  able  to  find  this  last  correspondence 
between  the  Englishman  and  the  American.     It  would 

1 


2  HOGARTH 

he  interesting-  to  know  in  what  terms  Doctor  Franklin 
recog-nized  the  value  of  the  English  artist,  and  how  the 
Englishman  acknowledged  compliments  from  a  man 
who  was  to  he,  a  few  years  later,  one  of  the  great  actors 
in  the  se])aration  of  America  from  England,  and  to 
help  that  development  of  character  which  has  taken  us 
further  and  further  from  understanding"  the  g^enius  of 
William  Hog-arth.  For  Hogarth's  genius  not  only  be- 
longed essentiallv  to  the  eighteenth  century's  middle 
strength,  to  ideas  unaffected  by  the  inquiries,  the  senti- 
ments, the  agitations,  which  closed  the  century,  and  are 
prolonged  into  to-day,  but  he  is  also  essentially  English 
in  the  national  and  insular  force  of  the  word.  Had  he 
lived  on  with  his  full  aggressive  powers  of  fight,  what 
caricatures  and  libels  might  he  not  have  created  to 
insult  the  views  and  the  actions  which  later  were  to 
belong  i<»  our  own  development. 

It  is  natural  to  wish  to  realize  the  state  of  mind 
of  thfjse  from  whom  we  broke,  and  to  pursue  our  in- 
tellectual genealogy  into  the  ancient  homes.  For  this 
re-entering  into  the  past,  such  a  work  as  Hogarth's  is 
a  great  help.     L'nlike  most  artists,  he  built  his  pictures 


HOGARTH  3 

out  of  the  more  transitory  materials  of  politics  and 
nationalism.  The  average  heart  of  his  time  and  place 
beats  strongly  in  his  pictures;  their  purpose  and  their 
morality  seem  at  first  sight  limited  to  the  use  of  that 
mon:ent  only,  and  it  is  only  through  the  man's  power 
— what  we  call  genius — that  the  eternal  truth  lurks  all 
through  the  smaller  transient  facts  he  liked  to  produce. 
At  first  sight,  we  may  well  feel  that  all  these  images 
are  born  naturally  of  that  gross  period  which  was  stead- 
ily preparing  England's  greatness :  the  political  venality, 
the  moral  corruption,  the  unblushing  effrontery,  as  well 
as  the  slowness,  the  patience,  the  stupidity,  which  hcl]x^d 
along  the  career  of  the  nation.  Religious  fervor,  chiv- 
alry, respect  for  the  virtues  of  others,  are  with  him  sub- 
jects of  contempt  and  abuse.  A  great  part  of  these 
surface  characteristics  are  still  visible  to  us  at  moments 
in  the  life  of  England;  perhaps  more  at  this  special 
moment  than  during  the  years  when  more  humanitarian 
sentiments  belonged  to  the  outside  of  public  life,  when 
the  quiet  of  scandals  had  not  been  agitated  by  the  ])ub- 
licity  of  the  newspaper,  and  the  gradually  growing  inter- 
change of  class  habits. 


4  HOGARTH 

\\'hen  wc  reflect,  however,  or  \\\\(tn  we  know  better, 
we  see  typified  in  Hogarth  a  rude  sense  of  justice,  and 
the  average  morality  and  commonplace  philosophy  which 
are  the  great  human  basis  that  saves  families  and  na- 
tions, whenever  the  individuals  of  note  appear  to  dis- 
grace the  good  rei)ute  of  their  fellows.  And  there  is  a 
certain  safety  in  calling  a  spade  a  spade,  even  if  we  had 
rather  not  mention  the  word,  and  an  open  dislike  of 
shams  may  sometimes  tend  to  discourage  them.  But 
though  the  caricaturist  and  the  satirist  occasionally  sup- 
port injustice  and  protect  the  wrong,  the  habit  of  an 
organized  dislike  of  what,  on  the  whole,  mankind  dis- 
likes,— in  others,  at  least, — must  produce  a  moral  tem- 
per which  \\il1  in  the  main  support  the  nobler  views. 

A\'ith  hlogarth,  there  is  only  the  difficulty  of  having 
a  sj)ade  called  a  spade,  and  that  we  who  look  at  his 
harsh  pictures  of  both  right  and  wrong  have  usually 
rather  diltercnt  ways  of  failing,  rather  more  elegant  suc- 
cesses in  virtue.  W'e  do  not  get  drunk  with  the  ostenta- 
tirm  of  Hogarth's  gentlemen,  l^ven  if  the  haggard 
brutality  of  the  j)0()r  and  ignorant  remains  the  same,  it  is 
probably  less  ])ictures(|ue,  that  is  to  say,  has  not  so  distinct 


//  O  G  A  R   T  H  5 

a  type  of  its  own,  rcseml)lcs  more  the  brutality  of  the  more 
fortunate.  The  variety  of  types  has  been  levelled.  The 
outside  dress  is  the  same  for  the  ''Prince"  and  the  vul- 
garian. Perhaps  the  ])rinces  have  come  down,  and  the 
vulgarians  have  risen,  but  T  am  not  at  all  sure  of  it.  Yet 
T  think  that  certainly  no  dilettante  foolishness  of  to-day 
can  be  dressed  as  typically  as  it  was  once  in  the  pictures 
which  Hogarth  saw,  and  which  he  painted  in  the  Rake's 
Progress  and  the  Marrioi^c  a  la  Mode.  Even  the  mild 
attempts  at  dressing  the  part  which  obtain  occasionally 
the  European  society,  need  to  be  violently  exaggerated  by 
the  caricaturist  to  make  them  typify  character. 

A  caricature  which  should  be  as  much  a  portrait  of 
real  life  as  Plogarth's  would  not  to-day  allow  us  to  look 
behind  the  scenes.  We  might  take  it  for  any  representa- 
tion of  commonplace  life,  select  or  otherwise;  it  would 
need  to  be  aided  by  some  abstract  artistic  rendering:  for 
instance,  to  be  in  select  black-and-white,  like  Mr.  Du 
]\raurier's  drawings.  The  caricaturist  of  to-day  who 
wishes  to  produce  an  adequate  effect  is  obliged  to  syn- 
thetize  like  Mr.  Caran  d'Ache,  and  help  us  lo  understand, 
1)}'  showing  how  much  lie  can  leave  out.    With  Hogarth, 


6  HOGARTH 

all  is  the  other  way.  He  remains  a  painter,  a  lover  of  all 
the  many  divisions  of  nature  which  painters  like.  It  is-^ 
possible  to  look  at  his  paintings,  or,  at  least,  at  some  of 
them,  and  forget,  as  one  might  before  nature  itself,  every- 
thing- but  the  beauties  of  physical  sight.^The  details  of 
reality  which  help  to  give  to  the  intellect  the  sense  of  fierce 
contempt,  are  often  pleasant  bits  of  technique,  as,  for  in- 
stance, to  choose  a  very  small  matter,  the  red  hair  of  Lady 
Ringley  in  the  ''Toilet  Scene"  of  the  Marriage  a  la  Mode, 
or  the  open  mouth  of  the  fashionable  singer. 

How  beautifully  the  shadow  falls  behind  the  group 
in  the  Election  Prints  (the  "Canvassing  for  Azotes").  In 
what  a  grand  way  its  great  diagonal  separates  the  little 
group  of  the  two  landlords  contendi  ng  for  the  vote  of  the 
newly-arrived  farmer.  In  these,  or  such  works,  Hogarth 
cm]:)loyed  that  "grand  manner,"  which  he  was  unable  to 
obtain  or  to  use  when  he  tried  for  it,  in  his  grand  subjects. 
Rut  of  that  psychological  question  we  can  think  further 
on.  '^  This  very  ])icture,  the  "Canvassing  for  Votes,"  gives 
us  at  once  separate  and  typical  costumes  of  the  "Blue" 
and  "Yellow"  landlords,  the  farmer,  the  electioneering 
agent,  the  Jew  peddler,  the  c()b])ler,  and  so  forth."*"  Each  "^ 


H  0  G  A  R   J   H  7 

one  wears,  as  it  were,  the  tools  of  his  trade.^  Their  habit 
of  hfe  is  indieated  in  every  fold  of  their  dresses,  nor  do  T 
suppose  that  it  could  have  entered  their  head  to  wear  a 
certain  cravat,  because  of  the  "Prince's"  wearinj^-  it.  In 
that  way,  what  we  here  call  caricature  is  separated  from 
our  problems  by  an  abyss  of  social  chano-es. 

It  would  seem  but  natural  to  look  upon  Hog'arth's 
famous  pictures  as  a  manner  of  continuation  of  the  Dutch 
painters,  who  represented  life  in  a  certain  spirit  of  cari- 
cature, but  pursued  in  their  works  a  continual  study  of 
all  the  problems  of  technical  painting-.  Nothing  can  be 
better  painted  than  a  Jan  Steen,  or  a  Brauer,  or  a  Ter- 
borch.  The  connection  between  the  painting  of  England 
and  the  painting  of  Holland  is  the  explanation  of  Ho- 
garth's similiarity.  But  it  is  only  in  his  respect  for  nature, 
and  his  liking  for  the  accomplishments  of  painting,  that 
this  similiarity.  exists.  There  is  very  little  among  the 
Dutchmen  of  that  fierce  moral  sentiment,  that  want  of 
respect  for  superiority,  which  is  the  great  strength  of 
Hogarth.  The  Dutchmen  laugh  w'ith  some  sympathy  at 
the  brutality  of  the  lower  orders :  when  they  represent 
people  of  their  own  class  or  of  the  ruling  classes,  they 


8  HOGARTH 

change  their  attitude  of  mind  to  fit  another  psychology. 
The  bUiff  cavaher  in  the  picture  of  Terborch,  who  good- 
naturedly  extends  his  fat  fist  full  of  money  to  the  modest 
lady  of  the  demi-monde,  is  represented  in  such  a  way  that 
we  perceive  at  once  how  his  mind  and  hers  work  more 
elaborately  than  those  of  the  canaille.  There  is  no  apparent 
moral  judgment  of  them  by  the  painter.  It  is  merely  as 
if  the  wall  of  the  room  were  removed,  and  we  saw  people 
unawares  and  exactly  as  they  are  externally.  There  is, 
perhaps,  as  little  caricature  in  such  a  painting  as  it  is  pos- 
sible to  find  in  any  painting  whatever.  Even  great  and 
noble  works  might  have  some  overcharge  (caricatura) 
necessary  to  underline  a  meaning  and  assert  an  ideal. 

With  Hogarth,  the  entire  meaning  is  loaded  with  the 
intentions  of  exaggeration  and  of  partisanship.  Had  he 
treated  the  same  eternal  subject  as  Terborch,  we  should 
have  felt  his  hatred  for  the  man's  brutality,  and  his  con- 
tempt for  the  woman's  meanness.  We  should  not  have 
the  impression  of  an  honest,  good  fellow,  somewhat  loose 
about  small  matters,  or  of  a  lady  with  a  keen  sense  of 
business,  but  who  might  begin  and  end  life  most  virtuous- 
ly and  properly.    A  spade  would  be  called  a  spade,  and 


II  O  G  A  R   T  H  9 

there  would  he  no  donht  ahout  it.  Perhaps  with  still  more 
pleasure  would  Hoi^arth  have  struck  a  hlow  at  the  vice  of 
the  higher  classes.  One  sees  how  near  he  is  to  that  ex- 
pression of  "virtuous  resentment"  which  honors  a 
Johnson,  and  how  he  feels  in  the  upper  classes  or  in  the 
classes  that  have  power,  an  overhearing  insolence  which 
even  the  colossal  rudeness  of  Johnson  was  sufficient  to 
meet  adequately,"*='As  Hogarth  said  himself,  his  pictures 
were  "addressed  to  hard  hearts. "t'  No  one  had  thus  paint- 
ed before  him,  and  the  hypocrisy  of  England,  its  increas- 
ing outward  show  of  respectability,  based,  as  such  things 
are,  upon  the  existence  of  real  virtue  in  many,  have  never 
allowed  another  expression  in  art,  either  literary  or  ar- 
tistic, or  such  a  moral  temperament  as  William  Hogartli. 
Nor  anywhere  else,  I  believe,  has  it  come  up  again,  ex- 
cept in  France  of  the  last  sixty  years,  where  a  tradition  of 
the  fierce  appeal  to  "hard  hearts"  has  persisted  from  the 
drawings  of  Daumier  to  the  last  caricatures  of  Forain. 

By  what  I  have  said  above,  T  by  no  means  mean  that 
Hogarth  was  an  imitator  of  the  Dutch,  but  it  is  impossible 
to  suppose  that  he  could  have  done  otherwise  than  learn 
from  those  who  were  the  masters  of  the  i^receding  age. 


10  //  O  G  A  R   T  If 

Tlieir  works  were  not  far  to  seek,  and  many  of  their 
s])ecial  (|ualities  he  hiniseh'  enilxxhes.  I  speak  of  him  as 
a  painter,  not  as  an  eno-raver  or  a  draiii^htsman,  in  the 
nncertain  sense  with  which  we  nse  this  last  unfortunate 
word.  lie  draws  always  as  well  as  is  necessary,  and  the 
interior  drawini^-.  as  it  is  called,  of  his  painting-,  is,  of 
necessity,  excellent,  or  we  should  not  have  that  vital  action 
and  accuracy  of  ex])ression  which  distin^-uish  him  in  his 
paintings  (|uite  as  well  as  in  his  eno-raviui^-s. 

It  is  alwavs  a  sur|)rise  for  foreig'uers,  who  have  not  the 
hahit  of  I  ioi^-arth.  and  know  him  only  by  his  engravings, 
to  find  him  so  excellent  a  technician  in  painting.  There  is 
something  heyond  the  excellent  (|uality  of  his  color,  and 
its  fulness;  heyond  the  proper  placing  in  the  air  of  the 
objects  he  wishes  to  rei)resent ;  beyond  the  subtlety  of  ex- 
ecution, either  coarse  or  tine,  of  an  enormous  mass  of  all 
sorts  of  material,  furniture,  carpets.  ])ictures  on  the  wall, 
the  out-door  surfaces  of  houses,  and  so  forth; — there  is 
also,  bevond  all  this,  a  certainty  and  manliness  of  touch 
which,  of  course,  should  belong  to  his  moral  character, 
but.  of  course,  also,  im])l\-  stud\-  and  constant  ])erce])tion. 


HOGARTH  11 

Johnson  used  the  right  word,  when  he  spoke  of  Hogarth's 
"curious  eyes." 

It  seems  difficult  to  understand,  or  rather,  to  have 
a  clear  understanding  of,  Hogarth's  failing  in  some  of 
his  greatest  qualities  whenever  he  tried  most  strenuous- 
ly in  those  subjects  which  most  needed  them.  "I  enter- 
tained," he  says,  "some  hopes  of  succeeding  in  what  the 
Puffers  in  books  call  'the  great  style  of  history-painting' ; 
so  that,  without  having  had  a  stroke  of  this  grand  business 
before,  I  quitted  some  portraits  and  familiar  conversa- 
tions, and,  with  a  smile  at  my  own  temerity,  commenced 
history-painting,  and  on  a  great  staircase  at  St.  Barthol- 
omew's Hospital  painted  two  Scripture  stories, — the  Pool 
of  Bethesda,  and  the  Good  Samaritan.  These  I  presented 
to  the  charity,  and  thought  that  they  might  serve  as  a 
specimen  to  show  that  were  there  an  inclination  in  Eng- 
land for  encouraging  historical  pictures,  such  a  first  essay 
might  prove  the  painting  them  more  easily  attainable  than 
is  generally  imagined." 

It  may  be  that  some  analyst  will  be  able  to  give  us 
the  exact  causes  which  allowed  Hogarth  to  make  such  a 
singularly  specific  failure  in  his  "historical"  paintings. 


12  HOGARTH 

1  mean  bv  this  con\-enti(mal  word,  for  instance,  the  paint- 
ings of  the  Pool  of  l^ctJicsda,  The  Finding  of  Moses, 
Henr\  J'lIL,  and  .Inne  Foleyii.  etc.  Proi)erly,  liis  his- 
torical ])ainting"s  are  the  "'reat  comic  ones,  TJie  March  to 
Finchley.  The  Election  Series. — indeed,  all  of  his  work 
which  has  a  comic  side.  Tn  the  representation  of  a  story, 
lie  seems  to  have  needed  this  accentuation  of  comedy  to 
keep  himself  from  caricature.  The  true  caricatures  are 
his  religious  paintings.  T  confess  to  a  certain  inability 
when  T  try  to  explain  and,  if  possible,  excuse  the  genius 
of  Hogarth,  in  these  sorry  instances.  It  would  almost 
seem  as  if  the  spirit  of  reverence  was  an  unaccustomed 
mood  with  this  man,  who,  however,  certainly  inculcated  a 
solid  respect  for  the  average  good,  and  a  contempt  for 
evil.  His  is  not  the  only  case,  however,  in  English  art.  It 
might  almost  be  said,  that,  except  for  something  of  J\lad- 
ddx  IJrown  and  something  of  the  Italian,  Ivossetti,'''  there 
nex'er  has  been  any  noble  rendering  of  a  religious  subject 
b\-  an  i^nglish  ])ainter. 

It  would,  therefore,  be  unjust  to  single  out  Hogarth, 
and  ]j()int  out  his  failure.  His  work  is  but  an  exaggera- 
tion of  the  attitude  of  other  I'Jigiish  ])ainters  who  have 

*I  have  purposely  left  out  William  Blake. 


II  0  G  A  R   T  II  13 

tried  such  sul)iccts.  11icy  seem  to  act  in  their  com- 
prehension of  the  ch'ama  proposed  to  them  as  if  they  must 
abstain  from  supposing;  it  to  belong-  to  human  nature,  to 
the  story  of  humanity,  and  to  merely  such  a  representa- 
tion as  might  be  made  in  an  orderly  sermon  or  a  tedious 
prayer.  Charles  Lamb,  in  his  defence  of  Hogarth,  has 
pointed  this  out.  Pie  ends  one  of  his  remarks,  in  the  di- 
rection that  I  am  taking,  with  these  words:  ''Our  artists 
are  too  good  Protestants  to  give  life  to  that  admirable 
commixture  of  maternal  tenderness  with  reverential  awe 
and -wonder  approaching  to  worship,  with  which  the 
A^irgin  Mothers  of  L.  Da  Vinci  and  Raphael  (themselves 
by  their  divine  countenances  inviting  men  to  worship) 
contemplate  the  union  of  the  two  natures  in  person  of 
their  Heaven-born  infant." 

It  might,  therefore,  be  j^ardonable,  as  by  a  race  in- 
stinct, that  Hogarth  should  have  failed  in  his  religious 
stories ;  one  might  say,  he  is  only  to  blame  for  having  con- 
sidered himself  bound  to  undertake  them.  Rut  he  is  also 
deplorable  when  he  undertakes,  ler  us  say,  Henry  fill. 
and  Anne  Bolcyn.  His  lieroes  are  nothing  whatever, 
at    the    most ;    thev    mav  hardlv  rise  to  the    height  of 


14  HOGARTH 

beino"  ridiculous.  Like  many  a  man  accustomed  to 
laugh  at  others,  Hogarth  does  not  seem  to  have  any 
perception  of  what  might  be  ridiculous  in  himself.  His 
astonishing  humor  stops  at  his  own  acts.  When  he  at- 
tempted to  ridicule  an  artist  immeasurably  greater  than 
himself,  Rembrandt,  his  caricature  seems  to  be  not  any 
real  attack  on  Rembrandt,  but  a  distorted  travesty  of  his 
own  qualities  and  his  own  faults. 

Here,  again,  the  disagreeable  side  of  British  char- 
acter comes  uj), — one  feels  the  narrow  hatred  of  the  op- 
ponent or  the  superior,  and  the  determination  to  carry  ofT 
injusiice  by  insolence.  The  great  rival  painter,  Rem- 
brandt.— if  we  think  it  necessary  to  bring  him  down  to 
the  level  of  Hogarth, — was  a  rival  in  all  Hogarth's  special 
f|ualities.  The  dramatist,  the  teller  of  stories,  the  master 
of  ccjmposition,  the  great  technical  |)aintcr,  the  mind  full 
of  humor,  but  as  grave  as  Hogarth  is  comic, — a  painter 
who  of  all  other  i)ainters  had  that  "curious  eye"  which 
Johnson  gives  to  Hogarth,  a  man  in  whom  tragedy  and 
corned)'  were  blended  as  in  no  other  artist  except  Shake- 
speare, and  in  all  this  the  greatest,  i)erha])s,  of  all  paint- 
ers, and  vet  a  Dutchman. 


H  0  G  A  R   T  H  15 

l^iis  distortion  of  Hog"arlh's  mind  is  a  sad  ihin^-  to 
dwell  upon;  hut  for  us  who  are  merely  collating  the  facts, 
so  as  to  understand  1  iof^-arth  and  his  times,  it  is  necessary 
to  take  in  these  marks  of  the  time  and  of  the  place.  It 
may  even  he  that  to  see  so  simply,  so  straight-forwardly 
as  Hogarth  the  ohject  of  his  dislike,  that  he  might  strike 
at  it,  a  certain  ca])acity  for  injustice  was  necessary  and 
was  developed  by  habit  and  l^y  the  combative  spirit  shown 
in  his  various  quarrels  and  controversies.  The  wrong- 
headedness  of  the  fighter  may  have  followed  liini,  even 
in  hi-s  peaceful  art.  As  usual,  in  the  long  run,  it  has 
turned  against  him.  But  the  remainder  is  solidly  good, 
and  Coleridge  was  right,  at  least  in  his  intention,  when 
he  speaks  of  "the  same  Hogarth  in  whom  the  satirist 
never  extinguished  that  love  of  beautv  which  belonged 
to  him  as  a  poet."  "Never  entirely  extinguished  the  love 
of  beauty"  is  true,  however  unfortunate  he  may  have 
been  at  moments  when  he  was  not  a  poet.  And  those 
are  the  cases  of  which  we  have  been  thinking.  And  Col- 
eridge is  right  again  in  pointing  out  the  gracious  exist- 
ence of  some  of  his  characters  among  crowds  of  de- 
formities and  vices.     So  that  some  such  figure,  in  the 


16  HOGARTH 

words  of  Colerido"e,  ''diffuses  a  spirit  of  reconciliation 
and  human  kindness." 

lliese  touches  of  syinpalhy  or  kind  feehnj^  not  only 
make  more  tolerahle  the  hardness,  even  the  hrutality,  of 
Hogarth's  satire,  hut  they  add  to  the  seeming"  truthful- 
ness of  the  scenes  de])icte(l. "  They  remind  us  of  the  ex- 
istence of  good  in  a  world  wher?  evil  appears  to  reign.^ 
They  make  more  endurahle  that  necessary  exaggeration 
which  must  helong  to  the  art  of  representation,  and 
which  makes  the  bad  to  be  punished  and  the  good  to  be 
triumphant,  though  w-e  know  very  well  that  in  some 
other  form  of  art  it  might  be  shown  how  the  innocent 
suffer,  and  the  guilly  go  at  large,  with  a  moral  lesson 
for  good  c|uite  as  powerful  as  the  narrower  justice  of 
pictorial  art. 

it  will  always  be  a  (|uestion  by  how  nmch  the  fail- 
ures and  mistakes  in  a  distinguished  career  are  a  neces- 
sary ])art  of  the  whole  story.  The  Tlogarlh  that  we 
know  and  care  for  is  so  detached  from  his  failures,  that 
it  is  only  from  scrupulousness  that  T  refer  again  to  his 
peculiar  ailiiude  in  his  heroic  compositions  and  to  his 
rather  strange  and  a])parentlv  useless  essay,  called  TJic 


HOGARTH  17 

Analysis  of  Beauty,  written,  as  he  says,  "with  a  view  of 
fixing  the  fluctuating-  ideas  of  taste."  But  as  these  vari- 
ous results  were  the  work  of  his  mind,  it  might  be  inter- 
esting to  draw  attention  to  them  and  find  a  reason  for 
them,  instead  of  passing  them  over  on  account  of  their 
being  solid  mistakes.  The  fighting  quality  of  Hogarth's 
mind  is,  perhaps,  more  at  the  bottom  of  these  produc- 
tions than  any  desire  for  expression  or  wish  to  com- 
municate to  the  world  ideas  which  he  considered  im- 
portant and  beneficial. 

Artists  must  have  suffered  in  England  from  the 
aggravation  of  a  continual  comparison  of  their  works 
with  those  of  the  Italian  schools,  prevalent  at  that  day; 
and  we  can  quite  w^ell  understand  the  annoyance  in  its 
various  details,  by  the  same  experience  in  our  own  coun- 
try under  the  constant  pressure  of  the  alleged  superior- 
ity of  any  kind  of  foreign  art.  Much  of  what  Hogarth 
complained  of  happens  in  any  similar  case,  and  nowhere, 
I  suppose,  has  any  growing  school  escaped  this  fate.  It 
is  worth  while  reading  what  Hogarth  has  said,  notwith- 
standing that  his  wrong-headedness,  his  anxiety  to  meet 
the  first  objection  that  might  come  up,  instead  of  choos- 


18  HOGARTH 

ing-  his  gTound,  has  made  the  larg-er  part  of  his  protests 
turn  against  himself.  The  same  causes  have  injured  a 
similar  altitude  of  William  Blake.  Yet  there  is  much 
wit  and  keen  observation  in  Hoi^arth's  special  pleading, 
and  a  permanent  value  in  some  of  his  aphorisms,  as, 
for  instance,  when  he  says:  "In  proportion  as  they  turn 
bad  proficients  in  their  own  arts,  they  become  the  more 
considerable  in  that  of  a  connoisseur.  As  a  confirma- 
tion of  this  seeming  paradox,  it  has  ever  been  observed 
at  all  auctions  of  pictures  that  the  very  worst  painters 
sit  as  the  most  profound  judges,  and  are  trusted  only, 
T  suj)pose,  on  account  of  their  disinterestedness/' 

To  c[Uote  or  select  at  any  length  would  be  against 
the  intention  of  a  preface.  Let  us  note,  however,  that 
occasional  fragments  of  the  Analysis  have  a  permanent 
value,  and  that  others  have  also  the  advantage  of  being 
ex])lanatory  of  some  of  Hogarth's  methods.  But  the 
entire  work  is  like  the  "historic"  ])aintings,  too  evidently 
(lone  on  purpose  from  a  motive  of  opposition  and  argu- 
ment, which  is  not  at  all  a  basis  of  sincerity.  Hogarth, 
like  many  of  us,  was  also  entrapped  by  the  idea  of  the 
existence  of   "Beautv"   as  an   actual   entity — something 


HOGARTH  19 

that  can  l)c  taken  hold  of  hy  the  hand,  or  apprehended 
by  the  mind  and  existing"  of  itself.  \\q  are  usually  the 
slaves  of  the  words  which  are  used,  or  which  we  use 
to  help  us  to  think;  and  we  make  divinities  of  them, 
quite  as  real  as  those  of  our  ancestors'  mytholog"y. 

The  pursuit  of  the  "Line  of  Beauty"  is  a  fallacy 
common  to  others  than  Hog-arth,  though  that  may  not 
have  been  the  guide  of  his  design,  but  merely  a  sort 
of  accidental  discovery,  used  afterward  as  a  formula  of 
excuse  and  defence,  and  a  weapon  of  attack,  or  another 
method  of  holding  his  own  and  fighting-  his  way.  Of 
course,  there  is  a  serious  truth  at  the  bottom  of  such  a 
disquisition,  which  might  be  useful  if  conducted  in  good 
faith,  which  was  impossible  to  Hogarth's  mind.  An 
essay  toward  the  classification  of  certain  likings  of  the 
human  eye  might  be  attempted.  These  prejudices  or 
reasonable  likings  of  the  eye  have  been  considered  or 
sought  after  in  all  works  of  art  which  time  has  approved 
of,  and  that  is  as  far  as  one  could  go  to-day. 

Hogarth's  uncritical  attitude  was,  of  course,  the 
very  worst  one  for  such  a  study,  and  it  is  quite  natural 


20  //  O  G  A  R   T  H 

that  this  essay  of  his  should  be  nncared  for  and  forgot- 
ten. If  written  with  sincerity,  it  mig-ht  have  explained 
both  to  the  la\man  and  to  the  youno-  student  some  of  the 
points  which  are  serious  considerations  in  the  mind  of 
artists — the  painters  and  the  sculptors.  It  contains  a 
description  of  what  must  be,  more  or  less,  Hogarth's 
manner  of  painting,  and  that,  of  course,  is  historically 
valuable.  Indeed,  we  cannot  be  too  well  persuaded  of 
the  imi)ortance  of  the  technical  statements  of  artists  as 
hel])s  toward  a  continuance  of  the  history  of  art,  and 
as  an  explanation  of  what  they  have  done.  I  mean  by 
this  last  that  their  methods  necessarily  react  upon  their 
conceptions  and  are  indissolubly  connected  with  them. 
In  this  wav,  Hogarth's  words  about  color  and  drawing 
are  worth  consulting,  all  the  more,  that  he  seems  to  have 
abandoned  his  own  views  in  those  curious  competitions, 
— those  ])ieces  of  work  which  he  did  to  challenge  others, 
or  to  ])rove  others  in  the  wrong,  b^or,  again,  I  can  see 
no  other  Ijetter  fornuila  as  an  excuse  for  the  so-called 
histriric   paintings. 

11ie  connection  of  The  Aiialysis  of  Beauty  with  the 


H  0  G  A  R   T  H  21 

''historic"  paintino-s  is  some  latent  l)elief  in  the  possi- 
bility of  the  manufacture  of  the  "beautiful  work  of  art," 
without  reference  to  emotion,  or  belief,  or  sensitiveness 
to  the  idea  expressed.  It  remains  astonishing'  that,  on 
the  contrary,  Ho^^'arth  should  not  have  seen  by  his  own 
work  that  only  that  which  had  the  basis  of  interest  and 
sentiment  could  be  good  or  beautiful. 

I  have  tried  to  find  some  explanation  in  the  com- 
bative quality  of  our  artist's  mind,  and  in  that  singular 
capacity  for  injustice  and  misapprehension  that  belongs 
to  his  nation.  But  it  is  only  a  way  of  stating  the  ques- 
tion over  again. 

Notwithstanding  the  apparent  failure  of  Hogarth's 
essay,  I  should  recommend  its  careful  persual  to  the  stu- 
dent of  artistic  criticism.  Not  only  does  it  contain  the 
expression,  however  confused,  of  one  peculiar  form  of 
the  artistic  mind,  but  it  has  also  interesting  statements 
of  many  truths  which  are  formulated  in  a  very  different 
manner  from  the  language  of  to-day.  This  slight  dif- 
ference of  angle  of  vision  might  allow  the  student  to  see 
still  better  the  shajK  of  the  idea.     It  has  so  interested 


22  HOGARTH 

me;  and,  indeed,  wc  mig"ht  well  be  pleased  to  find  an 
expression  of  the  eighteenth  century  in  whatever  Ho- 
garth has  written.  As  we  leave  behind  more  and  more 
the  manners  and  expressions  of  thought  of  the  last  cen- 
tury, we  may,  perhaps,  realize  how  necessary  to  under- 
stand ourselves  is  the  study  of  our  fathers. 

John  La  Farge. 


OBngratJings  after  l^ogartb 


DON  QUIXOTE 

Six  of  the  seven  subjects  that  follow  were  engraved 
by  Hogarth,  probably  in  1737  or  1738,  for  Lord  Car- 
teret's Spanish  edition  of  Cervantes's  masterpiece,  pub- 
lished by  Tonson :  but  not  proving  acceptable,  they  were 
set  aside  in  favor  of  Vanderbank's,  which  were  engraved 
by  Vandergucht. 

The  seventh  print,  Sancho's  Feast,  though  probably 
engraved  by  Hogarth  about  1733,  has  been  put  at  the 
close  of  the  series,  it  being  considered  more  convenient, 
in  view  of  its  uncertain  date,  to  include  it  with  the  others 
illustrating  earlier  passages  of  the  same  work.  This 
print  was  probably  drawn  and  engraved  as  a  sample  of 
the  artist's  conception  of  the  humorous  spirit  of  Cer- 
vantes's text  at  a  time  when  Hogarth's  efforts  were 
being  directed  to  book  illustration. 

There  are  two  other  plates,  attributed  by  Mr.  John 
Ireland  to  Hogarth,  illustrating  Don  Quixote,  but  their 


DON     QUIXOTE  —  Continued 

authenticity  is  not  unquestioned.  Even  still  less  accept- 
able is  a  series  of  twelve  other  illustrations  that  have 
been  credited  to  the  same  pencil  for  the  same  work.  De- 
tails of  these  prints  are  therefore  unnecessary.  The  seven 
engravings  following  are  unquestionably  Hogarth's. 


PLATE  I 

MARCELA'S  DEFENCE  AT  THE   GRAVE  OF 

CHRYSOSTOM 

This  print  illustrates  the  scene  at  the  burial  of  the 
shepherd-student  Chrysostom,  when,  after  Ambrosio  had 
finished  reading  the  lay  of  the  dead  man,  Marcela,  the 
lovely  shepherdess,  suddenly  appears,  and  defends  her- 
self against  the  blame  attributed  to  her  of  having  caused 
Chrisostom's  death  by  not  requiting  his  love.  Don 
Quixote,  the  chivalrous  defender  of  the  weak,  has  lis- 
tened to  her,  and,  convinced  by  her  reasoning,  stands 
ready  to  forbid  any  one  to  follow  her  after  her  declama- 
tion. 

The  incident  is  narrated  in  Part  I.,  chap,  xiv.,  of 
Don  Quixote,  done  into  English  by  Henry  Edward 
Watts. 


DON  QUIXOTE— Plate  1 

M  A  RCE  LA'S     DEFENCE     AT     THE     GRAVE     Oh 
CH  R YSOSTOM 


PLATE  II 
DON    QUIXOTE   CARED   FOR   AT   THE   INN 

During  his  adventure  with  some  evil-minded  Yan- 
guesan  carriers,  the  Knight  of  the  Rueful  Feature  had 
received  severe  punishment  as  well  as  unworthy  defeat. 
He  had  been  unable  to  overcome  the  storm  of  staff  blows 
that  they  rained  on  him.  The  chivalrous  gentleman  is 
here  portrayed  lying  uneasily  on  a  coarse  pallet  in  the 
loft  of  the  second  inn  that  he  deemed  a  fair  castle,  and 
to  which  fortune  had  guided  his  steps  with  his  faithful 
Sancho.  The  innkeeper's  wife  and  daughter  are  minis- 
tering to  his  needs,  and  covering  his  bruised  body  from 
head  to  foot  with  healing  plasters,  while  Maritornes,  the 
Asturian  serving-wench,  does  duty  as  light-bearer.  San- 
cho, who  perforce  has  individual  recollections  of  the 
ill-fated  encounter,  is  philosophically  endeavoring  to 
bear  his  own  pains  while  sustaining,  in  argument  with 


PLATE     II  —  Continued 

the  hostess,  his  master's  reputation  against  the  tell-tale 
bruises  that  sug^G^est  his  having  been  beaten  rather  than 
having  fallen  on  rocks.  Assuredly,  there  is  no  lack  of 
character  in  this  boldly  executed  engraving. 

The   text  illustrated  is   in   Part   I.,   chap,   xvi.,   of 
Watts's  translation. 

{Frontispiece) 


PLATE  III 
THE   LOFTY  ADVENTURE  AND   RICH  WIN- 
NING OF  NAMBRINO'S  HELMET 

One  of  the  most  ludicrous  incidents  recounted  by 
the  sage  Cid  Hamet  BenengeH  is  that  illustrated  by  this 
print.  The  Manchegan  knight,  after  his  thrilling  ad- 
venture in  which  he  discovered  the  fulling-mills,  pur- 
sues his  wandering  course  and  sees  a  mounted  man  wear- 
ing a  glittering  head-covering,  which  he  takes  to  be  the 
enchanted  helmet  of  Mambrino.  As  the  man  draws 
near,  Don  Quixote,  without  parleying  with  him,  bears 
upon  him  with  lance  couched,  at  Rozinante's  full  gallop, 
but  the  barber  (for  such  he  was,  mounted  on  a  gray  ass, 
and  wearing  a  clean  and  shining  brass  bason  over  his 
new  hat  to  protect  it  from  the  falling  rain),  with  pru- 
dence, slides  down  from  his  ass  and  scampers  off,  leav- 
ing the  coveted  and  gleaming  prize  to  the  proud  knight, 
whose  fatuous  imagination  has  blinded  him  to  the  fact 


PLATE     III  —  Continued 

that  the  discomfited  horseman  was  a  poor  ncii^hboring 
village  barber,  mounted,  not  on  a  dapple-gray  steed,  but 
on  a  poor  ass,  and  wore  but  a  commonplace  barber's 
bason  over  his  hat. 

The  adventure  is  related  in  W'atts's  Don  Quixote, 
Part  T.,  chap.  xxi. 


DON  OUIXOTE-Pi.ATK  111 

THE      LOFTY     A  D  V  l.  \  T  U  R  H      4  .\' D     RICH      U/W/.M,       o/ 
MAMBRINO'S    HELMET 


PLATE  IV 
DON   QUIXOTE    LIBERATES   THE   GALLEY- 
SLAVES 

Borne  onward  by  his  impetuous  zeal  in  the  cause  of 
knight-errantry,  the  ingenious  Don  Quixote  is  unable 
to  discriminate  in  his  sacred  task  of  relieving  the  op- 
pressed and  redressing  the  wrongs  of  the  weak.  This 
print  illustrates  Part  I.,  chap,  xxii.,  of  the  Watts  ver- 
sion, which  describes  the  don's  meeting  with  a  chain- 
gang  of  galley-slaves  marching  under  the  conduct  of 
guards:  their  tales  in  answer  to  his  questioning  suffice 
but  to  quicken  his  ardor  in  their  defence.  He  attacks 
the  commissary,  unhorses  him,  and  then  runs  a  tilt  at 
the  other  officers.  In  the  iiiclcc,  the  convicts,  seeing  a 
possibility  of  escape,  break  their  chain  and  complete  the 
discomfiture  of  the  guards.     One  of  the  most  desperate 


PLATE     IV—  Continued 

of  the  party  is  being-  freed  by  Sancho  from  his  fetters, 
but  the  latter  is  evidently  much  in  dread  of  the  conse- 
quent vengeance  of  the  Holy  Brotherhood.  That  the 
freed  criminals  should  turn  on  their  deliverers,  and,  after 
severely  maltreating  them,  strij)  them  of  their  belong- 
ings, is  readily  understood;  even  the  sturdy  faith  of  Don 
Quixote  was  shaken  for  a  moment  by  this  misadventure. 


DON  QUIX()TP:-Platk  1\' 

D  O  A'     0  I  ■  /  V  O  T  F     I.  I  H  H  R  A  T  h.  S     T II I      (,   I  I.  I.  A   )     S  /.   /  I    /;  V 


PLATE  V 

DON  QUIXOTE  MEETING  THE  KNIGHT  OF 

THE  RANGES 

Since  the  misadventure  with  the  galley-slaves,  but 
a  few  hours  had  elapsed,  when,  under  apprehension  of 
the  Holy  Brotherhood's  capturing  them  for  their  illegal 
interference,  Don  Quixote  and  his  faithful  squire  take 
to  the  fastnesses  of  the  Sierra  Morena  to  keep  in  hiding. 
Thither,  too,  from  the  same  motive,  the  arch-rascal, 
Gines  de  Passamonte,  takes  refuge,  and  completes  the 
measure  of  his  ingratitude  by  robbing  Sancho  of  his  ass. 
While  continuing  their  journey,  Don  Quixote  finds  the 
money  and  belonging's  of  some  luckless  traveller;  the 
former,  Sancho  secures  as  a  coverted  i)rize  that  his  mas- 
ter disdains  while  revelling  in  the  love-sick  verses  found 
in  a  memorandum-book.  This  find  stirring  the  don's 
curiosity,  he  determines  to  discover  by  whom  they  were 


PLATE      V  —  Continued 

abandoned.  Chance  directs  them  in  the  way  of  a  goat- 
lierd.  who  explains  the  appearance  of  a  distraught  creat- 
ure in  the  neighl)orhood.  During  their  conference,  the 
ill-starred,  tattered  Knight  of  the  Ranges  approaches 
them.  After  suffering  himself  to  be  embraced  by  Don 
Quixote,  the  "Tattered  one  of  the  Sorry  Feature"  stands 
back  to  examine  the  knight's  features  and  armor,  in 
order,  as  it  seems,  to  recall  them  to  his  memory. 

This  meeting  is  the  subject  of  the  illustration,  and 
the  incident  is  related  in  Watts's  text,  Part  L,  chap,  xxiii. 


DON  QUIXOTE- Platk  V 

/)  O  A'   (JUIX  OTE    M  EE  T  S    T  H  E    K  A  /  (i  //  /    ()  I     1  H  E    R  A  A  (i  E  S 


,  :M>:«iKi^.M-  is, -i:  N-:-..'»;  ;^;«..c«i.s-iM4tOfc;r-!as 


PLATE  VI 
THE  CURATE  AND   THE   BARBER   DISGUIS- 
ING THEMSELVES  TO  CONVEY  DON 
QUIXOTE  HOME 

Great  was  the  alarm  of  the  priest  and  barber  for 
Don  Quixote's  safety  when  they  learned  from  Sancho 
of  his  master's  vag'aries.  The  faithful  squire  had  left 
the  knit^ht  in  the  Sierra  Morena  to  muse  over  his  lady's 
beauty  while  he  undertook  a  mission  to  the  fair  Dul- 
cinea  at  El  Toboso.  On  arriving  close  to  the  inn  where 
he  had  previously  sufifered  the  indignity  of  being  tossed 
in  a  blanket,  he  fell  in  with  the  priest  and  barber,  and 
recounted  his  enteri)rise  and  the  knight's  whereabouts. 
As  a  result,  Don  Quixote's  old  neighbor,  the  ])riest,  con- 
ceived the  design  of  inducing  the  don  to  return  home, 
by  cHsguising  himself  as  an  afflicted  damsel,  the  barber 
to  assume  the  guise  of  her  squire.  Then  falling  in  with 
the  chivalrous  knight-errant,  they  would  beseech  the  don 
to  grant  the  boon  of  his  accompanying  them,   without 


PLATE     VI—  Continued 

knowini^"  their  destination,  to  redress  the  damsel's  injury, 
a  boon  tliat  the  flower  of  chivah-y  could  not  refuse. 

The  ])rint  shows  the  friends  efl'ectin^^-  their  disg"uises 
in  a  room  at  the  inn;  the  landlady  is  a  willing-  accom- 
l)]ice  in  the  well-meant  deceit,  and  acts  as  dresser,  while 
the  gentle  Maritornes  views  the  priest's  transformation 
with  marked  delight. 

Sancho,  who  was  acquainted  with  the  plot,  is  seen 
at  a  little  distance  from  the  inn  regaling  himself  right 
merrily,  and  worthily  upholding  his  reputation  for  table- 
valor.  Why  he  would  not  venture  within  the  inn,  as  well 
as  the  other  details  incident  to  the  illustration,  are  de- 
scribed in  Part  1..  chaj).  xxvii.,  of  Watts's  text. 


DON  QUIXOTE— Plate  VI 

THH.     CURATE     AND     THE     BARBER     DISGUISING 
THEMSELVES 


PLATE  VII 
SANCHO  STARVED  BY  HIS  PHYSICIAN 

In  Cid  Hamet's  veritable  history  it  is  recorded  that 
the  faithful  Sancho  was  invested  with  the  governorship 
of  the  Island  of  Barataria.  After  an  account  of  the  pro- 
foundly- wise  judgments  rendered  by  this  later  Solomon 
in  the  Hall  of  Justice,  it  is  stated  that  Sancho  was  con- 
ducted to  a  sumptuous  palace,  within  a  chamber  of  which 
a  royal  and  very  elegant  table  was  laid.  With  great 
dignity  and  attended  by  great  ceremony,  the  governor 
occupied  the  only  seat  furnished  at  the  table.  On  one 
side  of  the  high  and  mighty  Sancho  stood  a  physician, 
who  carried  a  whalebone  wand;  courtiers,  ladies,  and 
pages  surrounded  the  governor's  table,  and  a  band  of 
musicians  furnished  dulcet  harmonies  in  a  neighboring 
gallery.  The  table  was  covered  with  dishes  of  fruit  and 
toothsome  meats  of  manv  kinds.     A  lace  bib  is   now 


PLATE      y  I  I  —  Continued 

dettl}-  tucked  under  the  o-overnor's  chin  l)v  a  gentle  pat^e. 
another  |)laccs  a  dish  of  fruit  before  him.  All  that  could 
.q-ratify  the  honest  but  "•luttonous  Sancho  is  within  his 
reach;  he  seizes  a  luscious  fruit.  l)ut  hardly  has  he  taken 
a  mouthful  of  it  when  at  a  touch  of  the  physician's  wand 
the  plate  is  snatched  away.  The  same  exasperating  ex- 
])erience  attends  the  governor's  attempt  to  partake  of 
partridges,  rabbits,  veal,  etc.,  till,  in  his  hunger-stirred 
wrath,  he  threatens  the  physician's  life,  and  declares  that 
he  will  chase  every  bad  doctor  from  the  island. 

This  masterfully  humorous  incident  is  told  in  Part 
IT.,  chap,  xlvii.,  of  Watts's  very  excellent  rendering. 

As  has  already  been  stated,  this  print  was  prob- 
ably engraved  a  few  years  earlier  than  the  preceding      'i 
six,  from  which,  too,  it  differs  in  style  of  execution. 


DON  QUIXOTE— PLATt:  VII 

SANCHO    STARVED     BY    HIS     PHYSICIAN 


PLATES  I  AND  II 
BEFORE  AND  AFTER 

"Two  little  pictures,  called  Before  and  After,  for 
Mr.    Thomson,    Dec.    7th,    1730."     (Hogarth    M.S.) 
These  afterwards  belonged  to  Lord  Bessborough.     In' 
1833  they  were  in  the  possession  of  Mr.  H.  R.  Willett. 
There  is  a  sketch  of  "Before"  in  the  Royal  Collection. 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA  LIBRARY 

Los  Angeles 

This  book  is  DUE  on  the  last  date  stamped  below. 


MAR  1 4 1992 


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315 


iliii  i  ii  ill  II III  III 
A     000  046  514     6 


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4  J' 


BEFORE 


AFTER 


f' 


n>*. 


ymy<^?S 


